New Paintings, a solo exhibition by Joe Mangrum, includes exciting original permanent sand paintings. These pieces utilize Mangrum’s signature technique of binding colored sand to canvas and carved-relief wood panels. The exhibit also includes a selection of conceptual artifacts from years of creating paintings and large-scale installations. Mangrum’s work combines a rich library of cultural patterns with nature, science and technology in spontaneous abstract compositions.

About the Artist
Joe Mangrum has completed over a thousand dynamic and ephemeral sand paintings in public spaces, engaging audiences in New York and around the globe. A graduate of The School of the Art Institute Chicago, Mangrum’s work has been featured in The Museum of Art and Design, the Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami, the de Young Museum in San Francisco, Doe Museum in The Netherlands, Sunshine Museum in Beijing, and Asia Society in New York. In 2012, he created a sand painting for the exhibition Watch Your Step at Flag Art Foundation. Mangrum is also a recipient of the Lorenzo Di Medici award in new media at the Florence Biennale.

For more information or to schedule an appointment, contact Joe at joemangrum@joemangrum.com

“A lifelong city dweller, I have always longed for a night sky lit by constellations. I’m searching for all that the modern human experience lacks.”  Saehyun Paik

About the Artist
Paik formed her communication style as an only child, and has always been curious about interaction between people. To overcome her difficulty adapting to different social situations in her youth, she learned to create dialogues through art materials. She continues to explore these “conversations” by blending two or more medias in each of her processes, producing two dimensional work and installations.

For appointments and more information about this and her other upcoming shows, please contact Saehyun at paiksaehyun@gmail.com, follow her on Instagram @paiksaehyun or go to her website at paiksaehyun.com/

(New York, N.Y.) August 24, 2017 – In partnership with Advertising Week, Times Square Arts presents artist Benjamin Lebovitz’s Borders on Times Square’s electronic billboards from 11:57 p.m. to midnight every night in September. This project is a part of Midnight Moment, a monthly presentation by The Times Square Advertising Coalition (TSAC) and Times Square Arts.

Earlier this year, Times Square Arts and Advertising Week put out an open call for Midnight Moment proposals from artists working in the advertising industry. The winning submission was Borders, created by art director Benjamin Lebovitz. Using Google Earth satellite technology — a familiar medium after Lebovitz’s work on projects for the company — Lebovitz depicts the world from above, displaying the international borders between countries like Nepal and China, the US and Mexico, Syria and Turkey, Israel and Jordan, and Kuwait and Iraq, along with the remains of the Berlin Wall and landscapes of Glacier National Park. Borders seeks to understand the world in a more unbiased way, urging viewers to reinterpret these geological and political divides as delicate, shared ecosystems and make a personal connection with the social responsibility to humanity and the environment.

Ben Lebovitz, Artist, said “My hope for this work is that it might compel us to examine what our interpretation of a border is and how we might begin to understand ways in which we can develop future systems for sharing resources between countries. With satellite imagery we can at a breadth see how our shared land is utilized. (Especially as it pertains to harnessing and the consumption of energy, transportation, and sustainable food and water solutions)”

Mari Kim Novak, President of Advertising Week, said “Times Square has been home to Advertising Week since the beginning and is one of the most iconic, entertaining, and creative places in the world. It’s incredible to celebrate the creative work of modern artists in this global hub that offers an unparalleled backdrop for engaging and cutting-edge content.”

Debra Simon, Times Square Arts Director, said, “Times Square is known for surrounding visitors with the spectacle of cutting-edge advertising. This partnership with Advertising Week celebrates the creative talent of the advertising world, as Ben Lebovitz’s Borders channels it into socially- and environmentally-conscious art.”

Fred Rosenberg, President of the Times Square Advertising Coalition, said, “Borders redefines the meaning of a geographical barrier. The artist, Ben Lebovitz, explores the capabilities of Google Earth and brings those beautiful images of the world to the screens of Times Square.”

Harry Coghlan, Chairman of the Times Square Advertising Coalition, said, “Ben Lebovitz cleverly uses Google Earth to access satellite and aerial imagery of different international borders, reminding us that the world is not so small after all. Borders reinforces that even countries separated by a barrier still share the same resources.”

The following digital screens are participating in the September Midnight Moment:

Midnight Moment is the world’s largest, longest-running digital art exhibition, synchronized on electronic billboards throughout Times Square nightly from 11:57pm to Midnight. Presented by the Times Square Advertising Coalition and curated by Times Square Arts since 2012, it has an estimated annual viewership of 2.5 million.

Times Square Arts, the public art program of the Times Square Alliance, collaborates with contemporary artists and cultural institutions to experiment and engage with one of the world's most iconic urban places. Through the Square's electronic billboards, public plazas, vacant areas and popular venues, and the Alliance's own online landscape, Times Square Arts invites leading contemporary creators to help the public see Times Square in new ways. Times Square has always been a place of risk, innovation and creativity, and the Arts Program ensures these qualities remain central to the district's unique identity. Generous support of Times Square Arts is provided by the. New York State Council on the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Visit www.timessquarenyc.org/times-square-arts/index.aspx for more information. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at @TSqArts.

Benjamin Lebovitz
Benjamin Lebovitz is an American Art Director, born in 1987, and currently residing in Oakland California. Ben studied at the Savannah College of Art and Design with a degree in Advertising Design. He has worked on projects for Nike, Jordan, Levi’s, Apple and Google. His most recent work focuses on social impact around human rights and environmental policy within the realm of interactive and experiential design. www.benlebovitz.com

Follow on Instagram at @blebovitz & Twitter @benlebovitz

Advertising Week
For one week, from September 25 – 29 in New York City, leaders from the advertising, marketing, media and related creative industries will join together to share their visions, passions and best practices, and engage in conversations about the many issues, opportunities and challenges facing the industry today.

From daytime thought leadership programming and seminars during the day, to networking and world-class entertainment in historic New York venues at night, Advertising Week offers a unique opportunity for industry professionals to come together and debate, discuss and consider the future of the business. Read more at newyork.advertisingweek.com/

The Vanessa Long Dance Company's “Dance, Pop, Politics” will showcase a series of short vignettes, each focused on a different social or political issue. Combining both theatre and dance, boundaries are pushed and questions are asked in hopes of creating a better world together.

About the Artists
Founded in October 2014, the VLDC has created over thirty-four works showcasing issues ranging from the environment to gender based issues. Vanessa Long strongly believes in storytelling as a positive way to reach the community. She believes, as many ancient cultures did, that storytelling is a relatable and effective way to remember the past and change the future. Because of the times we currently live in, the VLDC's work is often short and to the point to keep audiences engaged. They have performed 87 performances between 2014-2017 all over tri-state area. VLDC has performed at several dance festivals and popular venues such as Dixon Place, Gelsey Kirkland ArtsCenter, University Settlement, and the Celebration of Whimsy Theatre. They have been featured on the cover of the Dance Informa August 2017 issue, with supporting article inside. The company has also beenfeatured in Broadway World, Asana Magazine, Yoga Magazine, Dance Teacher Magazine. VLDC has performed in Peru - Lima, Peru - Chincha Alta, Peru - Laran, Peru and is traveling for performances in Borgo San Lorenzo, Italy on August 26th. They are absolutely ecstatic to be back at Anita's Way and working with Chashama Again!

Independent Visions: Helene Schjerfbeck and Her Contemporaries, from the Collection of Ateneum, Finnish National Gallery, an exhibition presenting fifty-five works by four celebrated Finnish artists, opens at Scandinavia House: The Nordic Center in America, in New York City, on April 29, 2017. The exhibition highlights the pioneering role of these artists at the end of the 19th century and in the early decades of the 20th: Helene Schjerfbeck (1862–1946), Sigrid Schauman (1877–1979), Ellen Thesleff (1869–1954), and Elga Sesemann (1922–2007). Coinciding with the year long celebration of the centennial anniversary of Finland’s independence from Russia, the exhibition provides a rich opportunity for American audiences to engage with these influential Finnish painters.

The exhibition is curated by Anu Utriainen, curator of collections at Ateneum and Dr. Susanna Pettersson, director of Ateneum, Finnish National Gallery. On view through October 3, 2017, the exhibition will be accompanied by a range of public programs for all ages and a new catalogue.

Drawn from Ateneum’s extensive collection, Independent Visions features Schjerfbeck’s complex self-portraits, Thesleff’s colorful woodcuts, Schauman’s lush and delicate landscapes, and Sesemann’s brooding Expressionist portraits. Sharing the experience of traveling and studying in France and Italy while maintaining strong attachments to their home country of Finland, these artists and their work reveal the excitement and turbulence of the modern period that generated a newly found independence—both cultural and personal.

Sean Kelly is delighted to present SHIFT, a major one-person exhibition by Brazilian artist Iran do Espírito Santo. Known for his wryly-subversive sensibility and precisely defined practice, this will be Espírito Santo’s first solo presentation in New York since 2012 and his fifth with the gallery. An opening reception will take place on Thursday, September 7, from 6-8 pm. The artist will be present.

SHIFT debuts three new bodies of work comprising sculpture, site-specific wall drawings, and works on paper. Continuing to engage the illusory effects of perception and scale, Espírito Santo will present ten pristine stainless steel sculptures in the main gallery space. Based on the specifications of standard industrial nuts and bolts, each work has been meticulously produced at a scale of 1:20, in two fully functional parts weighing 600 lbs. total. Installed throughout the gallery in a grid-like pattern that underscores their mechanical precision, these elegant and surreal works are milled by machine and then painstakingly hand-finished. Simultaneously lush and austere, these works embody the paradoxical qualities that define all Espírito Santo’s work in disparate media.

Like the minimalist artists that preceded him, Espírito Santo treats the floor as an integral element for his indus-trially produced sculptures, though he makes clear the distinction between his own work and minimalism. “I don’t make conscious reference to minimalism in particular, but certainly those registrations are embedded, [sharing qualities of] repetition, industrial materials, and industrial finishing. There is a fundamental difference, however, which is representation, a quality minimalism opposes.” In a related but different vein, Espírito Santo will also produce site-specific, monochromatic wall drawings in each of the main gallery’s four corners. Painted in 56 carefully calibrated shades ranging from white to black, the works gradate subtly from light to dark, creat-ing a perspectival illusion that suggests the wall is gently curving into the corner. Titled Compression/Clockwise, the four drawings suggest a clockwise movement that parallels the movement of a nut and bolt, linking them closely to the sculptures throughout the gallery. The artist and a team of assistants will create these labor-intensive works over a three-week period leading up to the opening of the exhibition.

Grounding the mechanical in the domestic and vice versa, a group of watercolors that reference geometric pat-terns of parquet flooring will be presented in the front gallery. Espírito Santo also sees these works linked to the sculptures, noting that those industrially made objects might bring to mind the factory floor or world of heavy machinery, whereas the watercolors have a domestic format and are informed by personal memories of places he has lived. Alongside these will be shown fastidiously rendered line drawings that allude to the spin-ning motion of the industrial lathes used to produce the bolts on view in the main gallery. Although these draw-ings have the crisp facture of computer-generated diagrams, they are carefully hand-drawn using ink and tem-plates the artist projected and cut especially for this series.

Espírito Santo’s works are included in the collections of many prominent international museums including The Museum of Modern Art, New York; Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; Museu de Arte Moderna de Săo Paulo, Brazil; Museu Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, Madrid, Spain; and the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin, amongst others. His work was featured in the 2007 Venice Biennale and in a touring retrospective that included stops at MAXXI, Museo Nazionale delle arti del XXI Secolo, Rome; The Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; and the Pinacoteca do Estado de Săo Paolo. Espírito Santo’s work was also included in the 28th Săo Paolo Biennale in 2008 and the Mercosul Biennial in Porto Alegre in 2009. In 2011, Espírito Santo was the subject of a major exhibition featuring site-specific wall works at the Illingworth Kerr Gallery in Calgary. Espírito Santo's first public work in the United States, Playground, was installed in Manhattan by The Public Art Fund in September of 2013 and is currently on view at The Fields Sculpture Park at OMI International Arts Center in Ghent, New York. Espírito Santo lives and works in Săo Paulo, Brazil.

Sean Kelly is pleased to present an exhibition of new works by Sun Xun, widely considered to be one of China’s most talented and ambitious young artists. A major new 3-D animated film entitled Time Spy, produced in late 2016, will be presented alongside a selection of the woodcuts used to create the film. This will be Sun Xun’s second exhibition with the gallery. An opening reception will take place on Thursday, September 7 from 6 to 8 p.m.

Composed of thousands of images of individual hand-carved woodcuts, Time Spy marks an evolution in the artist’s practice. Constantly developing new techniques in his process, Sun Xun adopts a different medium for each of his animations. For this film, he produced thousands of woodcuts and then transformed images of each woodcut into 3-D film, with each frame of film requiring eighteen pictures per second to pass in front of the camera lens.

The film employs images of traditional Chinese themes such as the five elements—metal, wood, water, fire, and earth—in a symbolic exploration of the nature of time and how we try to make sense of it. Motion is a leitmotif of the film, as a violin with wings flies through a sky filled with spinning moons, while rotating machinery gives way to strange landscapes and oscillating pressure valves. Sun Xun’s films do not have a “story,” but their themes usually arise out of trips he takes to other countries.

In the case of Time Spy, inspiration came from an excursion to the town of Le Brassus, home to Audemars Piguet, the Swiss watchmaker who commissioned this work. Sun Xun described it as one of the best places on Earth to watch the stars. “The people that watch the stars stop thinking about life. Space is huge but we are limited…. Only Time can be both huge and limited…. This is my starting point.” In this exhibition, viewers will be able to view the woodcuts in tandem with the film, gaining insight into not only the artist’s creative process, but also the seemingly magical ability of film to transpose concrete form into ephemeral imagery.

For media inquiries, please contact: Hannah Gompertz at 212.202.3402 or hannah@suttonpr.com
For other inquiries, please contact: Janine Cirincione at 212.239.1181 or Janine@skny.com

Sean Kelly Gallery will be open by appointment only for the month of August. Beginning on September 8th, the gallery hours are Tuesday through Friday from 11am until 6pm and Saturday from 10am until 6pm.

Beth Livensperger's Crises examines the underlying tension within our collective relationships to culturally-normalized instutitions such as courts, museums, and schools. Depicting a delicate balance between power, restriction, and threat, Livensperger explores individual agency within the public sphere.

The architecture in her works is overwhelming, detailed with blank windows and yawning doors. Figures mill aimlessly, gawking, distracted or bored. Featureless, dowdy, and often reduced to silhouettes, the figures in her paintings are passive, not agents of change or disruptiondwarfed by the ominous buildings, her figures are confined by these insitutional spaces. Concrete barriers, security gates and even oversized potted plants control the motion of vehicles and people.

The paintings ultimately hover between the pleasures of color and gesture and an anxiety conjured by the contrasts throughout the series.

About the Artist
Beth Livensperger is a painter who lives in Queens and works in Brooklyn. She has exhibited widely within New York City and beyond. Currently, Livensperger has a studio through Chashama's Space to Create program and she has been an artist in residence at Abrons Art Center in New York City as well as the Vermont Studio Center and the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, among others. She holds a B.F.A. from the Cooper Union and an M.F.A. from the Yale University School of Art.

For more info, visit her site: bethlivensperger.com or contact: beth.livensperger@gmail.com

(New York, N.Y.) August 21, 2017 – In partnership with House of Trees, Times Square Arts presents Word on the Street, a public art commission of political and poetic banners created by female artists and writers that speak directly to the urgent, timeless concerns of the individual, the community, and the requirements of citizenry. The exhibition will appear on street pole banners and Bigbelly solar-powered trash and recycling receptacles in Times Square from August 29, 2017 – February 2018.

Word on the Street is an ongoing text-based public art initiative produced by artist collective House of Trees, consisting of original banners and signage designed by renowned female international artists in collaboration with female refugee fabricators based in Texas. Artists and writers include Anne Carson + Amy Khoshbin, Carrie Mae Weems, and Wangechi Mutu. The ongoing series will continue with new notable female artists premiering original artwork for Times Square signage in the spring of 2018.

Originally created from felt as wearable protest expressions during the Women’s March, the Word on the Street banners and signage consist of a series of poetic political works that speak directly to the moment. The project’s deployment throughout Times Square seeks to create a network of visually disseminated texts that help articulate, empower, and support positive responses to the ever-changing social and political landscape.

On September 7th from 12pm-1pm & 6pm-9pm, Times Square Arts and artist Amy Khoshbin invite New Yorkers and Times Square visitors to Workshop on the Street, where they will create their own wearable gear with phrases and iconography made from colorful felt in the form of banners, signs, sashes, capes, or badges at the Broadway Plaza between 43rd & 44th Streets. This group is encouraged to exhibit their signs around Times Square and transform these art objects into protest materials for upcoming demonstrations or to wear simply as a celebration of free speech. Workshop on the Street engages the community in social action and encourages a physical artistic response alongside the Word on the Street banners.

House of Trees, Artist Collective, said, “We’ve asked poets and artists to respond to the politics of the day with a landscape of poetry; using phrases, art, and made-by-hand signage to inspire, and at times resist. At a time when language is being societally devalued, how can we as artists and writers use words creatively to rouse political action? Word on the Street Times Square continues this investigation with some of the most inspiring females we know.”

Anne Carson, internationally-acclaimed writer, said, “Our doctor said the fake windows would work fine: just like seeing the world and with all those bright colours to keep our spirits high. But we could hear that in the future it was raining. To see rain again! We'd been told there would be no more rain.”

Debra Simon, Director of Times Square Arts, said, “Word on the Street has brought us an incredible collection of female artists to literally bring the art of protest language and handcrafted imagery from the streets to the street poles and signage in Times Square, a public space known for free speech and expression.”

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Times Square Arts, the public art program of the Times Square Alliance, collaborates with contemporary artists and cultural institutions to experiment and engage with one of the world's most iconic urban places. Through the Square's electronic billboards, public plazas, vacant areas and popular venues, and the Alliance's own online landscape, Times Square Arts invites leading contemporary creators to help the public see Times Square in new ways. Times Square has always been a place of risk, innovation and creativity, and the Arts Program ensures these qualities remain central to the district's unique identity. Generous support of Times Square Arts is provided by the. New York State Council on the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, and the National Endowment for the Arts. Visit www.timessquarenyc.org/times-square-arts/index.aspx for more information. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram at @TSqArts.

House of Trees is an arts collective working to expand the public appreciation and understanding of contemporary art through the production of murals, performances, installations, and other high-visibility publicly engaged artworks. House of Trees projects are interventions in unpredictable sites, curated for both specific audiences and the larger public. House of Trees has mounted projects nationally and internationally with venues including the Kimmel Center in New York City; the Hotel Tropicana in San Antonio, Texas; and the Watermill Center in Watermill, New York, among others. House-of-trees.org.